Since the 1990s, Texas has been a Republican stronghold. The late Democratic governor, Ann Richards, was voted out of office in 1994, when she lost to Republican George W. Bush (who went on to be elected president in 2000). And Democrats have been struggling in statewide races in Texas ever since.

Yet in 2018, former Rep. Beto O'Rourke (D-Texas) narrowly lost to incumbent Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas). And the fact that a Democrat came within striking distance in a U.S. Senate race sent shockwaves through Texas politics.

Now, according to Politico, another U.S. Senate race is worrying GOP strategists in the Lone Star State.

Two well-known conservatives — veteran Washington Post columnist George Will and former Deputy White House Press Secretary Sarah Matthews, who served in the first Trump Administration — believe that Texas' 2026 U.S. Senate race could be in play for Democrats if State Attorney General Ken Paxton is the GOP nominee instead of incumbent Sen. John Cornyn. However, Will and Matthews also stress that Cornyn, if he wins the primary, would be very hard to beat in the general election.

In an article published on February 26, Politico journalists Liz Crampton, Jordain Carney, Samuel Benson, Alex Gangitano and Adam Wren report that "Republicans in Washington" are "growing more alarmed that their increasingly vicious intraparty contest could cost them a must-win Senate seat."

According to the reporters, "Sen. John Cornyn appears to be headed to an expensive and nasty 10-week runoff against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, with a strong chance that Paxton wins the nomination even after national Republicans spent months airing his dirty laundry all over the Texas airwaves in an effort to boost Cornyn….If Cornyn loses the primary, Senate Republicans worry they could be forced to spend hundreds of millions of dollars that could otherwise go toward key battleground races in expensive states like North Carolina, Georgia or Michigan, complicating their path toward holding Senate control."

Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-South Dakota) is among the Republicans who is sounding the alarm about Texas.

Thune told Politico, "Honestly, if you look at the polling in a general election setting, I don't think it's outside the realm of possibility that the seat (flips), depending on who the Democrats nominate….We have to be prepared to spend there, and that's a very different scenario if Cornyn's the nominee. He is by far, I think, the best candidate on the ballot in a general election — not only for the Senate, but also, for down-ballot races in the House that could be impacted by the Senate race too."

A GOP operative, interviewed on condition of anonymity, told Politico, "All signs indicate that Paxton probably finishes first. We're just hoping the gap is close enough (that) the narrative isn't 'Paxton kicked the crap out of Cornyn.'"

Cornyn told Politico, "Unfortunately, the attorney general has got so much baggage and corruption in his wake that he will jeopardize our chances of keeping this seat red in November. I believe that I can help President Trump in (the) end of his second term by not only winning this race, but bringing along some of these congressmen who are running in these five new congressional seats. Ken Paxton jeopardizes all of that."

Lone Star politics were recently rocked by a bombshell when, in a deep red district in the Fort Worth suburbs, Democrat Taylor Rehmet won a special election for a Texas State Senate seat by 14 percent. Donald Trump carried that district in 2024 by 17 percent in 2024.

In Texas, Democrats perform well in major urban centers like Houston, Austin and El Paso but struggle in statewide races. The last time a Democrat won a gubernatorial race in Texas was Richards' victory in 1990, and the state's last Democratic U.S. senator, Bob Krueger, left office in 1993 after losing a special election to Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison.

Moreover, Texas hasn't gone Democratic in a presidential race since Jimmy Carter in 1976.

A fight has been brewing in the GOP. At the center of it are Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, with the former pushing Senate Republicans to pass the SAVE America Act at any cost — including nuking the filibuster — and the latter trying to impress upon the president that they simply don’t have the votes to do it.

When asked if the matter is straining on their relationship, Thune laughed.

“It’s just another normal week, right?” He said. “Some days are better than others.”

The conflict is driven by two factors.

First is Trump’s urgency to pass the SAVE America Act, an election reform bill that critics say is a blatant attempt to disenfranchise opposition voters and broadly manipulate election processes to favor Republicans. Trump has urged the bills passing before the midterms, and while it has passed in the House, it doesn’t have the 60 votes necessary to avoid a legislative filibuster in the Senate, dooming it to fail.

This brings us to the key sticking point between Trump and Thune. Trump wants Senate Republicans to nuke the legislative filibuster by forcing a “talking filibuster,” which would mean that Democrats’ only hope of delaying the vote would be to physically hold the floor for as long as possible while speaking. This would allow the bill to pass by a simple majority as soon as the speaker relented.

But “the votes aren’t there to nuke the filibuster,” Thune has argued in recent days. “It’s just a reality.”

Those votes don’t exist because many in the GOP believe this approach is “risky” as it could allow Democrats to turn the tables in the future and lead to endless legislative gridlock.

Thune has been trying to communicate this to Trump, but the president has kept up his pressure on Senate Republicans, prompting influencers in the MAGA orbit to join the fight. Elon Musk, for example, has accused Thune of impeding Trump’s agenda. As a result, some have begun calling for Thune’s removal as majority leader.

But as Republican Senator James Lankford pointed out, the situation is more complicated than any one vote.

“This is a math issue,” he said.

A Fox News reporter on Monday burst President Donald Trump's bubble on the contentious SAVE America Act, reporting that he and Senate Majority Leader John Thune are "not on the same page" when it comes to the math for getting the bill passed.

Trump has demanded that Republicans in Congress make the bill their "no. 1 priority" and has pledged not to sign anything else until it is done. The bill would mostly focus on addressing the president's long-debunked claims about widespread voter fraud from non-citizens by requiring proof of citizenship to register and photo IDs at polling places. The bill, in its current form, would also eliminate virtually all mail-in voting and create new hurdles for women who changed their name after marriage.

It is those provisions and more that have GOP leaders in the Senate unsure about the SAVE Act's chances of passing in the chamber. Trump and his MAGA allies have pushed for Thune to alter filibuster rules to invoke a "talking filibuster," which would require Democrats, who are lockstep in their opposition to the bill, to speak continuously on the floor to prevent it from passing with a simple majority. Otherwise, the bill is currently stalled, with no chance of overcoming the 60-vote legislative filibuster limit.

On Monday, Chad Pegram, Fox News' chief congressional correspondent, discussed the tough situation with host Stuart Varney during a Fox Business segment, noting that Trump has also insisted that the Senate forgo an upcoming recess until the SAVE Act has passed.

"He even wants Senate Majority Leader John Thune to single out Republicans who are opposed to the legislation," Pegram said. "Mike Lee of Utah wants to forgo the Easter recess. ... Backers of the bill believe they can wear everyone out and pass the bill with a simple majority. The Senate blocked a plan over the weekend to attach to the bill a prohibition on men competing in women's sports."

He continued: "Republicans contend elections are not secure, even though every major study says voter fraud is extremely rare... Now, President Trump demands that Republicans eliminate the filibuster to pass the bill, but it's about the math. Thune says the Senate lacks the votes to nuke the filibuster. He and the president are not on the same page."

President Donald Trump has signaled to Senate Republican Majority Leader John Thune that he will not sign legislation that would pay TSA workers and all other DHS agencies except ICE — a Democratic proposal that Thune is now recommending — until his controversial SAVE America voter ID and citizenship legislation is passed.

"Senate Majority Leader John Thune approached Trump with a new proposal on Sunday — at the urging of his Senate Republican colleagues and even some White House aides," Punchbowl News reported on Monday. "Thune told Trump that Senate Republicans would support funding all of DHS except ICE, the agency at the center of the bitter partisan dispute over Trump’s immigration crackdown, according to senators and aides."

"Trump said no, according to multiple sources," Punchbowl News added. "The president wants Republicans to stay in D.C. and keep fighting with Democrats over DHS funding and the SAVE America Act, the GOP’s voter ID and proof-of-citizenship bill."

Calling Punchbowl's report "pretty significant," The Bulwark's Sam Stein said, "that more or less puts Trump now on the hook for the TSA funding lapse. "Trump also went further in a phone call with News Nation D.C. correspondent Hannah Brandt on Sunday, saying he's willing to let TSA workers go without paychecks for "as long as it takes."

Brandt reported that Trump told her that Democrats want to make a deal on DHS funding but he doesn’t "think any deal should be made on this until they approve" his SAVE America bill.

Trump told Brandt he was prepared to have ICE agents deployed to airports, "For as long as it takes."

She then asked, "Some lawmakers are saying they should just fund TSA while they negotiate on DHS. What do you think about that?"

Trump said, "Now that I did this the Democrats want to make a deal. And I don’t think any deal should be made on this until they approve SAVE America. Ok, so you have a scoop."

In a Truth Social post on Sunday night, Trump called passing the SAVE Act "far more important than anything else we are doing in the Senate."

Critics slammed the president.

"So just to be entirely clear Trump wouldn't even sign a DHS bill. He's holding your air travel hostage for the SAVE Act," wrote former Biden Domestic Policy Council director Neera Tanden.

"So there you go, it’s Trump holding TSA/DHS funding hostages telling Republicans to vote it down unless he gets the SAVE Act first," said Professor and policy consultant Adam Cochran. "Trump doesn’t care about the safety of Americans. He just wants his bill to help him steal the midterms."

Senate Republicans are “anxious about the midterms," and “the mood is shifting” among GOP leaders who once assumed they could coast to victory in November, Politico reports.

Politico spoke with 10 Republican senators and aides, many of whom "are now openly predicting a tough battle to hold onto control,” thanks in large part to President Donald Trump’s policies.

Their party is struggling “to keep the focus on affordability policies that lawmakers want to make the centerpiece of their midterm campaign,” Politico explains, as Trump wages an unpopular war in the Middle East that comes with rising oil prices and potential downstream impacts to the U.S. economy. “The Senate passed a major housing bill this week but it faces an uncertain future in the House. Trump himself told Republican lawmakers Monday that housing is not a top concern for voters,” the report adds.

Trump ally Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) told Politico he’s “glad he’s not on the ballot” as “Republican senators [warn] that the party writ large needs to hammer home cost-of-living measures.”

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), another Trump supporter, acknowledged “prices are high,” and told Politico he hopes Republicans will “take some votes to lower the costs.”

Trump, meanwhile, has set his sights on passing the SAVE America Act, an effort to overhaul U.S. elections and "institute tough new citizenship and photo ID requirements in order to cast a ballot,” Politico reports. But Senate Majority Leader John Thune is locked in conversations with the White House, and Thune has warned the president his chamber does not have the votes to pass the bill.

The president has even demanded Republicans nuke the filibuster to ensure passage of the SAVE America Act — but just last week, Thune had to deliver some “not so good news” to Trump on his demand.

“The votes aren't there to nuke the filibuster,” Thune explained. “It's just a reality. … The math doesn't add up.”

“Voting on the SAVE America Act is something we will do, but passage is not guaranteed,” he added. “I just wouldn't assume that that's going to happen.”

President Donald Trump is facing opposition from some prominent Republicans over his hardline voter ID bill.

The controversial SAVE America Act barely scraped by in the House of Representatives and has languished in the Senate for weeks, but President Trump is pressuring Republicans not only to pass it — he has added demands that would make it even harder for Republicans and Democrats to support the legislation.

Trump wants the bill to curtail mail-in voting and has called for anti-transgender language to be added to it.

Now, as House Republicans convene for a three-day meeting at his Doral Golf Resort in Florida, he’s urging GOP leaders to act immediately.

On Monday, Trump told House Republicans in a televised speech that they must pass the SAVE Act because if they do, Democrats “probably won’t win an election for 50 years, and maybe longer.”

He also threatened to sign no other legislation until the SAVE Act comes to his desk — a proposition some Democratic lawmakers did not find objectionable.

“GOP leaders now have to drum up support from members reluctant to dive into the culture war of transgender politics when they’d prefer to focus on affordability,” Politico reports. “And the mail voting provision was left off the package last time for a reason.”

Over in the Senate, several Republicans “signaled Monday they aren’t behind the president’s call to significantly limit mail-in ballots, touting the success of the practice in their own states.”

“I don’t want the federal government telling me that I can’t have mail-in voting or absentee ballot voting,” Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) told reporters. “There’s nothing wrong with mail-in voting if you have the right standards in place.”

Trump is also continuing to pressure Senate Republican Majority Leader John Thune to commit to a talking filibuster to pass the bill — a move Thune strenuously opposes.

Leader Thune “delivered a public reality check on the ‘complicated and risky’ idea Monday,'” Politico noted.

“Having studied it and researched it pretty thoroughly, you have to show me how, in the end, it prevails and succeeds,” Thune told reporters on Monday, as NBC News reported. “Because I think what has been promised out there is that it would actually, in the end, get an outcome. And I find it very hard to see that based on actual past experience.”

“We can’t find a piece of legislation in history that’s been passed that way,” he added.

Seeking to avoid “a bruising internal filibuster fight,” Senator John Kennedy (R-LA) “floated passing the SAVE America Act through reconciliation Monday, despite the lack of a clear budget connection.”